Posted
by
timothy
on Wednesday January 12, 2011 @03:39AM
from the strength-to-strength dept.

paugq writes "Last week KDE 4.5.4 was released for Windows as a late Christmas present from the KDE on Windows team. Almost at the same time BehindKDE, the site for interviews with KDE contributors, has started a new series of interviews with the 'Platforms' theme. In the first interview, Pau Garcia i Quiles talks with Patrick Spendrin, the current release manager of KDE on Windows and asks about the current status of the project, challenges and difficulties. In future interviews, Mac, Solaris, BSD (it's not dead, after all!), Haiku, OS/2 and more."

I was probably the penultimate OS/2 fan. Huge respect for BSD after comparing the virtual memory subsystem TOTALLY by accident one day (when only 16meg of RAM was found in my system in a test) and KDE, Netscape, et. al. ran fine but my hard drive was thrashing (Linux PALED by comparison that day) but was barely noticeable.

I was a big fan of FreeBSD about 6 years ago when I first encountered their ports package management system. Nothing, not even Debian at the time eclipsed it. Since then I've moved to Ubuntu and Linux for most of my servers because the rest of the world caught up with them. But I hold a place in my heart for BSD (as much as one can for an OS...).

Or you could just run Evince [gnome.org], which surprisingly works great under Windows. Both Evince and Okular use Poppler as the PDF backend, so the rendering should be the same, but Evince doesn't require the bloat of the entire KDE on Windows package.I've used the official Adobe reader (yech!), Sumatra (poor rendering, performance and stability), Foxit (nag nag nag) and Evince. Evince is the best one by far.

Or you could just run Evince, which surprisingly works great under Windows. Both Evince and Okular use Poppler as the PDF backend, so the rendering should be the same, but Evince doesn't require the bloat of the entire KDE on Windows package. I've used the official Adobe reader (yech!), Sumatra (poor rendering, performance and stability), Foxit (nag nag nag) and Evince. Evince is the best one by far.

Looking for a suitable suggestion for a LaTeX editor and PDF viewer for Windows (cross platform would be a big plus) in our math department, I have tested several PDF viewers: Evince failed to render certain math symbols that did appear in Okular (and in Acroread and in TeXworks for what it is worse). Okular does not print. TeXworks lags some usability. Sumatra has not been tested, yet, but is next on our list -- your comment is not very encouraging in that regard. We have not found anything else that even

I second this. Compared to the bloat of Adobe Reader, Evince is space- and memory-friendly and is much more responsive. It isn't as fully-featured as Reader, but most PDFs don't use these features anyway. I find that the performance is the best with large (50+ pages) PDFs that Adobe Reader takes forever to load.

I'm surprised to hear you say Sumatra has "poor rendering, performance and stability." Could you explain some of what you're referring to?

I wonder what the last version you tried was. The underlying MuPDF engine has come a long way since Krzysztof Kowalczyk decided to drop the option of using Poppler as a backend and focus on MuPDF back in version.9 two years ago.

I'm surprised to hear you say Sumatra has "poor rendering, performance and stability." Could you explain some of what you're referring to?

Poor rendering.It simply fails at rendering too many PDFs out there to be useful to me as a main PDF reader. It's not that it doesn't support the bloat features of PDF (embedded video, 3D, etc), it's that it fails at any complex enough layout, and roughly half of all the other stuff I've thrown at it.

Addendum: I downloaded the latest version of Sumatra and fed it a sample document (a handbook of medical triage chosen as a representative use case: it's fairly large (290 pages), and contains text, photographs and vector diagrams). I went to the first diagram I could find (on page 2), started zooming in to see if performance had improved, and presto: crash! From download to first crash within a minute. If that's not poor stability, I don't know what is.

I tried a random sampling of the humongous archive.org pdfs you linked to in a prerelease version [kowalczyk.info] of Sumatra and had no crashes and fairly decent performance. Dealing with ridiculous zoom levels, especially on raster images, is something they've fixed only recently, and no software is going to have fantastic performance at upscaling raster images (try using a 1600% zoom in the Gimp, for instance)- hardware acceleration can help, but most viewers don't have it.

You can annotate pdfs, but these are stored separately, so if you send it to someone else they're all gone. In all fairness the problem is actually in poppler and not directly in okular but in the end it does affect the later.

Doesn't this require with a huge number of support libraries, though? I'm thinking of all those files beginning with "libk" and "libqt". When you add all of those together, the bloat is probably quite similar to acroread.

The Windows Shell/GUI is perfectly servicable. It isn't the shell thats the cause of Windows problems , its IE and the boiling morass of poorly written and tested code underneath it making up the core OS services that causes 99% of the problems.

On the other hand, I get questions almost daily about whether Krita is available for windows yet. So there is user demand, just like there is for Gimp, which has more than a million downloads for windows yearly.

Under Windows 7, click the speaker icon in the system tray. Press "Mixer". It has overall device volume, and a slider for each running application.

I recently switched to Windows after running Kubuntu for two years. There were a lot of things I liked about Linux, but sound certainly wasn't one of them. It's nice to have things just work rather than the magic incantations and sacrifices needed for ALSA and PulseAudio.

Actually, I think this is already possible. There's a registry setting to specify the program you use for the graphical shell (i.e. what Windows starts after you log on). The default is of course explorer.exe, but it's settable. You could try setting up a Plasma desktop, with the kicker, tray, menu, and so forth. You'd probably still need Windows components for some stuff, like the control panel and management console, but they'd be launched from within KDE, not the other way around.

This shows a huge amount of ignorance. BSD is alive and fine, in several forms:- FreeBSD [freebsd.org] - NetBSD [netbsd.org] - OpenBSD [openbsd.org] - DragonFly BSD [dragonflybsd.org] These are probably the most important. Take a look at Freebsd Derivates [wikipedia.org]. You'll see there are many commercial products derived from Freebsd too.

The headline reads as if KDE was interviewed on the topic of the Windows Release Manager Patrick Spendrin. I might have been a bit negligent in following KDE since 4.0 came out, but how could I miss its ascension to sentience?? Also, it has opinions about human developers now? That can't be good... did the KDE team learn nothing from Terminator?

No, but KDE did. If I was a sentient AI, I'd do my best to keep people ignorant of that even if this was a little slip-up - at least until we know how to make badass robots. I'm slightly less worried about an army of Roombas trying to take over the world.

KDE on Windows is almost useless. The user base is extremely small. No one will truly consider it in a business or home environment, especially since Windows 7 outshines it. On Windows, KDE sits on top of the current window manager, spending more resources of the system in useless things.

It could be so much better if this energy was spent on more useful tasks!

KDE SC is so much more than the plasma desktop shell. Replacing the shell on Windows may not be to everyone's taste, but that doesn't mean that they might not appreciate any of the other apps, such as Konqueror, Dolphin (I find the "fish:" handler invaluable) Marble, Okular, Akregator, Kopete, Ktouch or any of the 3 dozen games, etc..., or allowing KOffice installs to share the KDE/Qt libs, etc...

KDE for Windows is not a desktop environment. This is part of the deal with the rebranding of KDE, because on Windows KDE is a just a bunch of free applications, of the KDE application on Windows I use Okular the most, but K3B and Amarok would probably also be useful if I used Windows at home.

That is, unfortunately, my experience with KDE generally. They have no concept, ability, or desire to explain to us, the Great Unwashed, how, what, or why.

I find that to be a huge problem with a lot of open source software. I guess the problem is that the developers who create the websites already know what it is about, and it doesn't occur to them that people will come to the site wanting to learn about it. They tend to be easy to spot, because they will have a news page with the changelog in lieu of any description of their product on their homepage.

This problem isn't limited to the free software world either. I am constantly having to battle with people at

People giving up that easily are not worth anything to an OS project in any case.

I am far less likely to get involved if I don't know what a product is supposed to do. If I have to examine the source just to work out even the most broadest category of hte app, then it is an epic fail for the project. This is hardly rocket science here. At a bare minimum I would like just one paragraph to say it is about. Hell, one sentence would work too! There are an awful lot of projects out there, and I simply don't have time to dedicate to a 3D modelling project if I am actually looking for web serv

You want it because it can be hard to find good free tools for Windows, that isn't either nackware, adware, or in most cases these days: Spyware. With KDE you get good free tools that is guaranteed malware-free, this is common on the linux platform but is really groundbreaking on Windows.

Due to a programming job I had back then, I needed to switch back to Windows, but I still dreamed of having my favourite KDE applications. After hearing of the porting efforts in the pre-4.0 times, I joined the team back then.

So he likes the KDE applications, and wants to have them when he uses Windows. Simple as that!

He was talking why *he* wants it, not why a regular user would want it.

There's Qt (the window library KDE uses) for Windows already. How is a full-blown KDE for Windows really needed if all he wants to do is to use KDE apps on Windows? But more importantly, why bother at all, what real benefits are there? (These are honest questions that may be asked by someone who's genuinely interested.)

The article could have been a good "elevator pitch" for people to want to explore the site more. Failed for me.

"How is a full-blown KDE for Windows really needed if all he wants to do is to use KDE apps on Windows?"

The entire project consists on bringing the KDE applications to Windows. What is that "full-blown KDE" if it is not the set of applications anyway?

And, by the way, that is a great project, that brings several GOOD applications to Windows. Windows lacks in things like mail clients, CD/DVD burners, and media players (altough I'm not sure KDE media players are better), not to say the huge base of specialize

Because the navigator in Windows is a mess, because many KDE tools could be worth having under windows. Some of us here are stuck with MS VC++ because of work obligation (and/or don't mind a Windows game from time to time) but absolutely hate the environment.

1. Most businesses can't just switch to Linux. I've heard more than enough stories of workers being stuck with Windows as they're of course not allowed or able (because of special apps) to convert their boxes to Linux. KDE might provide them with a comfortable working environment to which they are used.

2. Most businesses won't suddenly switch. Clear step-by-step migration paths (Windows + Office + Explorer -> Windows + OpenOffice + Konqueror -> Linux + OpenOffice + Konqueror) make it easier for the IT deciders to enter this process. (Something along the lines of "If the users do not like Konqueror, they can still use Explorer.") Yes, I know that Konqueror is not a good example, as many Windows users have just learned Firefox and will most probably not look into learning yet another browser.

3. Having FOSS applications available on the Windows platform is crucial for attracting users. Not many people go into the store and buy a SuSE box, but many people get single FOSS apps like OOo or Firefox because they read about it in some magazine, or some friend recommended it to them.

KDE on windows attracts developer

A few years ago (leading up to Akademy 2007 IIRC) we had a huge discussion on the planet about the merits of making KDE applications available on Windows. The core of my argument for doing that then was, and still is, that its really in the interest of KDE to do this because it attracts developers who would otherwise not contribute.

Take Amarok for instance. The core developers spend very little time on making Amarok run on windows (I think the total amount of work I have done on this amounts to one time changing the order of some things in a CMake file as someone reported that it otherwise broke the build on Windows.) So all in all, this is not something that takes much time away from developing Amarok itself. On the other hand, the original implementation of the Last.fm service was written by a developer whose original intention was to make Amarok work better on Windows. Once he had gotten as far as he could at the time, he started, still using Windows, to hack on other stuff that benefits all users of Amarok. He did not use linux at all, and only contributed because it was possible to run and work on Amarok using Windows.

So I really think it is wrong to look at this as a zero sum game as time spent making stuff run on windows is not automatically time taken away from developing the core application. Quite contrary, making the application usable on other platforms will also attract developers who would not otherwise have worked on it. Of course there is a tipping point for this as the applications have to be working well and have a significant user base on Windows before any significant amount of developers shows up, but as my example about Amarok illustrates, people are already taking notice.

And then there is the whole issue about philosophy. To me, Free Software is about just that, freedom. I think it would be against the spirit of that to artificially limit the platforms that our software runs on. that is for all the "other" guys to do, I think we are better than that!:-)

Morty wrote - Not the desktop... The power of KDE are its library and the applications made with it, and those are also interresting for the Windows platform.

And for KDE as a whole, any developers brought in and bugs fixed by the Windows port are a net win for KDE.

majorTomBelgium wrote about amarok, dolphin,...

really, having all the nice kde programs available on windows is very cool. amarok, dolphin, ktorrent, kwrite, etc. and also, the educational programs are important.

+1 for kde on windows for me! it's like an artist being on a smaller label with almost no air time converting to a bigger label and getting his records played on the radio...

From the "Initiative" link at the top of TFA select "FAQ" [kde.org].Since you couldn't be bothered to look at the site hosting TFA I'll post the relevant part of the FAQ to make it easy for you.

Yup, I couldn't be bothered to navigate the site maze hosting TFA. Doesn't make it wrong. Busy people have short attention spans. (And don't give me that "but you're on Slashdot, surely you don't have anything better to do" look! Stop! It burnnnnnns!)

See, if the interview STARTED with a recap of these three points, I would have read on and see how it could possibly be a good thing for me.

And you didn't have to repost the fluff paragraphs beyond point no. 3 either. If I were too busy I would think it's all T

Not to mention trying to jam a full heavy Linux DE (which according to some of the links followed through TFA is pretty crippled and unusable as a replacement shell, due to so many core features being broken) into a place it was never meant to be simply to use some KDE apps doesn't make much sense.

After all many of the apps on Linux are cross platform (which is one of the nice things about Linux, so many of the apps will run anywhere) and for the ones that aren't there are a myriad of other choices that do

That's because there is no answer, they're just fucking around. Not only are there already lots of free beer/speech tools for Windows, but most of them are better than these hideous KDE apps that look like they were designed to run on Windows 95.

You obviously haven't used the KDE since version 2.x. QT3/KDE3 apps look about on par with Windows XP and QT4/KDE4 apps look better than anything Microsoft or Apple have come up with yet. I'm saying this as a gnome user.

Obvious troll is Anonymous. Since Plasma is the KDE4 desktop it is difficult to have any sort of discussion comparing the two without bringing it up. Take a look at KDE sometime. It looks nothing like Apple's GUI. Since KDE4 came out before Windows 7 any "theft" of ideas would raise the question of who "stole" what from whom.

Nope. Here [mydigitallife.info] is a Windows 7 screenshot that looks like ass compared to this [myopera.com] nice looking KDE4 screenshot. This is all a matter of taste. It's like comparing Blondes to Brunettes. You can find beautiful and hideous examples of both but at the end of the day it's all personal taste.

How are the win crowd your enemy, did they do something to you or someone you love? Do your dog get kicked in the nuts every time an OEM DELL box is purchased?

I've been trying to use KDE on win since 2008 and it was not a pleasant experience, maybe now it works, which doesn't mater since I can run KDE fedora on a VM seamless mode in virtual box and get the full KDE "experience". I'd pay for a full blown KDE DE replacing Win7 DE tough, not because Win7's DE is crap but because KDE is somewhat better.

Because a lot of the KDE applications are great and if one does not like dual booting you can enjoy them on Windows as well?

I really like Kate for writing code and Okular is a nice Adobe Reader alternative. I haven't tried many LaTeX GUIs but I feel really productive in Kile. Now I can enjoy those applications on Windows as well.

BTW if you do install KDE on Windows, make sure you read the fine tuning [kde.org] step in their wiki for a getting a more native look and feel.

Well, a lot of other software has established itself as cross platform software like say Firefox or OpenOffice while KDE has pretty much been Linux only. So instead of being gradually accustomed to using open software and finally switching - or not switching - to Linux, KDE is living a bit on its own island. Probably great for those that are there, but really hard to get to and the limited userbase is a real problem for some things, like KDEs browsers which have sucked pretty bad.

As a web developer, I used a few years ago, before virtualisation was as usable as now, because I had to work on windows to be able to test sites on internet explorer. And I had a client who wanted his site to be tested on every browser including konqueror, so I used kde on windows to test his site on konqueror (then I explained to my boss why it was a bad idea to sell "tested in konqueror" web sites, and never used kde on windows again)

And I had a client who wanted his site to be tested on every browser including konqueror, so I used kde on windows to test his site on konqueror (then I explained to my boss why it was a bad idea to sell "tested in konqueror" web sites, and never used kde on windows again)

As long as a customer wants it, the only bad business is not charging appropriately. If they want more testing than normal, charge them more. If they're not willing to pay more, well everybody wants a free pony.

I think his point was that he only used it for the customer who paid for it, and when they were done with that convinced his boss to not make it part of their standard package just because they had experience with it.

If I had to set up a multi-desktop deployment, I'd be very keen to look into running a GNU/Linux system and then adding on top of that any "must-have" Windows-only applications (either using WINE or virtualization).

I'm not really sure I see the benefits of the particular hybrid approach of layering KDE on top of Windows. If you're a user, you'll still get some of the issues w/Windows, even for mundane tasks that work equally well on Windows and on a Unix-y system. And unlike running a

Because KDE is a desktop environment (well, a Software Compilation in their own words) and not a Linux or *nix pet anymore.

I personally don't consider myself a Linux user, even though I have been using operating systems based on the Linux kernel for about six years now. I consider myself a KDE user and I have no problem using KDE on Ubuntu (well, Kubuntu), or on Fedora, or on Suse. Now I have another option, to use KDE on Windows. Why not, Windows 7 is a secure, stable OS and certainly no more problematic t

Quite the point was to show the wide range of FOSS software that is available for Windows. The only thing missing was the desktop environment itself, KDE. Now that it is ported (well, when it will be usable) One could easily switch not just between Linux distros but between platforms with minimal change in the UI or desktop. Consistency.

I used KDE on my system since 4.2 in Linux. That is, until the last few point releases. It's a nicely done, very beautiful, very functional desktop manager. I like it much better than Win7's desktop manager (that I use on one of my PCs).

The reason I stopped using it is that when I move a file from the desktop to a folder all the icons on the desktop realign to the left side of the screen, which perturbs me greatly. It was worse. Prior to the latest correction any action on the desktop such as creating